


the path to you

by wokeboke



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Developing Friendships, Gen, M/M, Not Beta Read, Small Towns, The city boy/country boy AU that no one asked for, is this going to turn into more? hell if I know
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-20
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2020-03-08 09:56:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18892291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wokeboke/pseuds/wokeboke
Summary: How two boys connected through long runs, beaches, and window conversations over the course of one summer.





	the path to you

**Author's Note:**

> this is an odd idea I have been working on. I stg I come up with a new au for these boys every two weeks
> 
> title is from the fates ost title of the same name! for some reason I associate it highly with Kiragi's supports so go give it a listen if you want

Hisame wakes up wide-eyed to strangers in his house.

The laughs and conversation are muffled by his closed door, but it’s too early in the morning and there are too many voices for it just to be his mother and father or even the old man living next door who they invite over for dinner regularly. He can hear those three familiar voices, but there are people he can’t recognize, too.

This calls for some good-ol’ reconnaissance.

For all the downstairs people know, he’s still asleep. And he can use that to his advantage.

He levies himself upright, taking care not to wiggle around too much. His room is right over the kitchen, so any noise he makes will radiate through the ceiling, blowing his cover.

He pushes his covers aside, swinging his legs off the bed, bare feet touching the chilly floor. He pads as lightly as he can over to the warm light spilling from behind the curtains, grabbing them and slowly pushing them aside to reveal a bright blue sky.

It’s only after he’s unlatched his window and let the summer breeze waft in that he realizes this may not be the most sensible way of finding out what’s going on downstairs.

His door _is_ creaky, though, and he’s very much relishing the feeling of freedom he has right now, so armed with the rationalization, he jumps.

* * *

 

Kisaragi doesn’t know what to think after opening the door to an empty room, fluttering curtains and an open window.

“Oh fuck he’s dead” is what he _does_ think after a few solid seconds of feeling the slow wind on his face. Then, “we’re only two stories high so he can’t be _dead_ , maybe real hurt at worst”. And finally, “oh fuck he’s real hurt”.

It is to his great relief that Hisame, this mysterious boy he’s heard exactly three (3) baby stories about, is not dead or ‘real hurt’.

The metal pane is cold to the touch as he leans on it, sticking his head out. A boy who looks vaguely like the baby pictures he’s seen is there too, hanging off the shaded wall in nothing but a light blue tank top and short shorts that should not even be classified as shorts. Kisaragi can see his thighs clearly. They’re as pale as they were in the photos.

“Aren’tcha chilly out here?” he asks. “Your legs are showin’.”

“I don’t know who you are,” Hisame says, pushing off of the wall. Kisaragi barely has time to suck in a breath and hold it in anticipation before he lands softly, lithe as a cat.

“I expect I’ll be meeting you later,” Hisame calls up from the ground, showing his back.

“Wait!” Kisaragi clambers over the pane and into a sitting position, legs hanging out into thin air. “Lemme come.”

He fully expects Hisame to back away and run off; after all, Kisaragi’s never scaled a two-story building and Hisame very clearly has, but to his surprise, he only folds his arms and says, “Fine. Let’s see how you do it.”

“If I impress ya, do I get a medal?” he shoots back, fighting the urge to add more sarcasm into the delivery than the words already imply.

“You get to not break your bones,” Hisame replies evenly, not rising to the bait. Somehow, the effect is infuriating.

He starts by pulling off his socks, throwing them down at Hisame while calling down, “Here, catch this” with poorly contained glee (Hisame does not catch either of his socks), reasoning that it’d probably be easier to not fall off the wall without any loose fabric to help him slip.

Clutching at the side of the windowsill, he pivots over onto the wall without pause, somehow finding footholds in the same position he’d seen Hisame in earlier. The bricks are cooler than he’d expected, like rocks by the sea but without all the spray.

“’m gonna jump,” he announces, just because he also saw Hisame do it. He looks back, over his shoulder, maybe for some confirmation or validation from someone who’s done it already. Hisame’s arms are crossed, still watching him. He doesn’t seem worried, though if it’s real or fake Kisaragi can’t discern from Hisame’s flat expression.

Validation or not, he had to jump. Sooner or later, he’d have to or else stay up there forever.

The action itself isn’t very spectacular. He gives it a few seconds to marinate in his mind, then pushes off the wall. Thinking before doing just wasn’t how he functioned; besides, taking risks had never done him wrong before, and it hadn’t done him wrong now. He lands with a soft thud standing on the grass, cool and wet from the morning dew. Looking up, he can see that it wasn’t a very high fall after all.

“Here.” The quiet voice and a hand tugging on the hem of his t-shirt sleeve cause him to turn round. Hisame has his hand out, two socks in hand. Kisaragi can read reluctant respect in the thin line of his mouth and the subtle puff of his cheeks. He stifles a grin before it rises to the surface and reaches for his socks gratefully. He didn’t earn a medal; he earned something worth a lot more.

“Hisame…kun, right?” he asks, though he’s almost sure, like ninety-seven percent, at this point, that this is Hisame. Kisaragi takes the chance to shake his hand, taking it easily in his own.

“Yes,” Hisame says, adding the last three percent to his conviction as their hands slip apart. “And your name? And why you were in my house?”

The breeze picks up, touching the grass around them. Kisaragi stuffs the socks into his underwear after trying to stick them in his pockets and realizing he had none. “Kisaragi, but people call me Kiragi.” He waits until Hisame nods, prompting him to answer question B. “’m visiting my gramps, who lives right besides ya, ‘n I think our parents are friends from high school or something.” At least, that was what he had gathered, sitting at the dining room table with both sets of parents, bearing witness to inside joke after inside joke.

“Sumeragi-san?” Hisame says after some time, referring to his neighbour and Kisaragi’s grandfather.

“Yeah,” Kisaragi confirms. “We’re here for a couple ‘a weeks.”

“Cool,” Hisame says, though the way his eyebrows furrow slightly when he says it implies he doesn’t think it’s cool at all, which makes Kisaragi want to say the next part even less.

“So…”

“And, I was hopin’ you could show me around? Take me around town?” Kisaragi adds before Hisame can express any more of his malcontent. “Your parents said it’s really nice here ‘n…if I had any questions I could ask ya?”

“They stuck me with tour guide duty, is that it?” Hisame asks flatly, visibly grimacing. Kisaragi feels his stomach sink into the ground a little. Had it been too much to hope that the only boy his age in this small town would be warm and welcoming?

To his abject horror and embarrassment, he feels an uncomfortable tug in his gut that means his eyes will inevitably start to water, no matter how hard he tries to hold the tears back.

It’s surprising, though. Had he really put _that_ much stock into Hisame’s willingness to show him around, this thinly-veiled mystery of a small-town boy and his unknown personality? The answer was yes, yes he had.

“If you don’t wanna, it’s okay,” Kisaragi says reluctantly, ever the self-imposed compromiser.  _Not everyone wants to make friends as much as I do,_ he reminds himself firmly in his mother’s words. _And that’s okay._

“No, it’s not okay,” Hisame says, echoing Kisaragi’s inner monologue so closely that it actually stops the tears threatening to flow over.

“Hn?”

“Follow me. And keep up,” Hisame orders, already padding away.

_Oh._ “Wait, no shoes?” Kisaragi calls after him in the absence of asking what caused the sudden change of heart. It’s the second time he’s seen this boy’s retreating back today.

“Get used to it, _city boy_ ,” Hisame calls over his shoulder, and that _hint_ of a teasing lilt in his voice does…interesting things to Kisaragi’s stomach, like it’s ignited a rising desire to beat Hisame in whatever game he’s playing.

Whatever it is, two can play.

“’Kay,” Kisaragi replies, because he can’t think of a witty comeback, but rest assured he’ll be more prepared in the future.

They leave dark footprints on the sidewalk as Hisame sets off at a mild jog. The concrete is cooler than Kisaragi expects it to be, but it’s understandable for so early in the morning. There’s so much he wants to know and discover about this tiny seaside town, and for some reason, about Hisame as well. It’s for the sake of enjoying his vacation and time here, he tells himself, stifling the persevering romantic in him that had always longed for the quaint air of small towns.

For now, he needs to focus on not getting lost.

**Author's Note:**

> right, that confession scene thing from the chatfic has not been lost yet :)
> 
> will probably continue this too. Thanks for reading!


End file.
